


ii. dāna

by Anusaya



Series: kāmaguṇa [2]
Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-19
Updated: 2011-10-19
Packaged: 2017-10-24 18:33:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/266578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anusaya/pseuds/Anusaya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chrome and Hibari on a mission together, Mukuro Plotting Vague Things Nefariously, teenage UST or something, really obscure hints of 186996 in all permutations, at least in an implied form. SEQUEL-ish (or in the same timeline/universe, though it can be read independently) to [i. jhāna].</p>
            </blockquote>





	ii. dāna

**Author's Note:**

> \+ LMAO SO ... I wrote this before the recent chapters about Chrome attending Tsuna's school. I imagined her as attending ... somewhere, albeit not Kokuyo proper, since Mukuro kinda wrecked it. Hence her dropping out. I guess all this is now a kind of alternate timeline, since Mukuro is still in Vendice, here. ONE POTENTIAL FUTURE. Or something. IDK. :|a
> 
> \+ Moretti - yeah I know there's a character named Moretti. I think it's a relatively common-ish name, tho. I didn't intend to suggest the two were conflated?
> 
> etc. standard disclaimers apply...

One year, Chrome moves away from the house which she shared with Ken and Chikusa.

Mukuro has not finished teaching her his techniques; she is an _adequate_ student, so far as he commends, but he is not given to superfluous praise, and this is well, for Chrome does not thrive on compliments. But Mukuro is only one of her teachers.

More immediately, there is also Bianchi, who takes hold of Chrome's trident, runs a fingertip along the metal edge (manicured nails; a line too white to be real at the end of each) and comments, in her easy and offhanded manner, that such a weapon only has limited uses in battle, and Chrome, if she is to succeed as Mist Guardian, must develop proficiency with firearms.

She escorts Chrome to the shooting range; stands beside her with her hands on her hips and a cool, indolent smile spread across her mouth as Chrome, after much fidgeting, does the best that she can.

"With practice," the other woman says afterwards.

They sit at the dining table.

Bianchi's shoulders are straight, chest outward, like a flamboyant bird. Scorpion on one arm, black ink, and everything about this woman, Chrome notes, has been touched in some respect. Trimmed eyebrows and mascara-laden eyelashes and blow-dryed hair, nice-smelling and straight. Designer clothing, expensive-looking, and a posture which exudes easy confidence. A posture which says: _I was born to wealth._ That mysterious gaze which seems to suggest many lovers, a line of men, and exhilarating times even preceding or following broken hearts.

Chrome remembers how she felt with the others girls she used to see. How she still feels, at times, when she notes the way her Boss looks at Kyoko-san: Not envious, exactly. Chrome is not given to envy, having long ago internalized her lot in life.

It's more like curiosity. What does it mean? Having a glamourous life? Being a member of some unspecified circle of important individuals? She tries her best not to be self-doubting, but each time a battle turns out disastrously, each time she suffers a kidnapping, a wound which leaves her debilitated, a sudden loss of her organs which fills her throat and nostrils with blood --

She loses. She has lost.

Mukuro had to assist her.

And the other Guardians are nice. They are patient. But it can't be that they don't notice. Because Chrome -- for all that she takes these moments and says, only, _I want to be stronger_ (which is all she ever gives, aloud) -- notices.

There are times when she still feels as if she would do better to slide under the table and disappear. Melt into a puddle such that no eyes are turned towards her.

"I was fortunate." Bianchi takes a drink of wine straight from the bottle. Chrome had watched her pouring a little into the meal, earlier. "I worked alongside the greatest hitman Italy had known."

"Reborn-san?" Chrome inserts the question as a necessary courtesy.

"Yes," is the only answer -- though, once more, her eyes glow with promise. Sultry evenings half a world away.

Chrome, to her credit, does not shiver.

"You should eat, you know." This time, Bianchi stands. Fixes herself a martini. "The food isn't poisoned. And you need to get some meat on you." Her face scrunches, for a moment. As if contemplating a misspeak. Then: "To put it another way, you need energy for what you're preparing to undergo."

Not entirely certain that the food _isn't_ poisoned, Chrome lightly prods a wrap of temaki-zushi with her chopsticks.

"I didn't _cook_ anything," Bianchi adds, triumphant. "It's quite raw. And the other girls prepared the rice."

Sushi, after all. Well. All right.

Chrome eats what she can, neglecting the topic of her anatomy, especially insofar as missing or replacement organs are concerned.

Afterwards, she is elbow deep in suds, hair pinned back, when Bianchi gives her a once-over and announces, unceremoniously, "You know, I have some accessories -- ones I've grown out of -- which I think would go well on you."

Her natural reaction is to murmur _no, thank you,_ but something about Bianchi's intensely thoughtful look halts Chrome's reaction.

She stops mid-scrub, gently biting her cheek.

Two hours and three experimental wardrobes later, Chrome sits with a monogrammed towel thrown around her shoulders, hands in her lap, knees together, hair slicked with styling products the likes of whose names she cannot properly pronounce (spray and mousse, benign: L'Oreal, Garnier Fructis, Cadonett): "Italian," Bianchi says, running the comb through what minimal hair Chrome has.

Italian. Mukuro is teaching her Italian. Chrome almost blurts this, but thinks better of it. Still, it is only for this reason that she feels inclined to pay attention to such words at all.

She cannot muster the energy for investment in -- in this.

Bianchi holds the ends of Chrome's hair as if measuring it. Then, she re-focuses her attention. Grips the signature tuft in between two fingers and runs it through them twice.

Chrome gives the barest of grunts, indicating that scrutiny as applied to _that_ singular element of her style is not strictly welcome. Bianchi, mercifully, seems to understand. She releases the cluster of shorter hairs without so much as a word.

"You may find it beneficial to grow your hair out, Chrome," she says.

Chrome's first reaction is to wonder what she means by _beneficial,_ but in the next instant of inspection, the remark is forgotten.

She exits the bathroom with new scents on her body and in her hair, a swipe of balm across her lips, clipped nails, two bags of clothing, and a box of jewelry which Bianchi insists is cheap but which feels very much less so to Chrome. Accessories.

"Take a look," she says, behind her, and holds Chrome's shoulders lightly as she brings her before a full-length mirror.

She looks.

Sees: Skinny girl with an eye-patch. Hole in her face hiding under a slip of black, now more pronounced for the vibrant, off-setting orange she wears. Chopped hair caught trying to extend itself, parts of it pinned up with multiple clips, parts of it tucked about her neck, her ears, scratching awkwardly.

Gaudy. Charity case. Something like that. Pessimistic outlook? Chrome shakes her head. Aloud,

"It looks very pretty. Thank you."

Three hours later, Chrome is exhausted and bleeding from the day's exertions, wearing nothing lovely at all, but only dirty slacks.

~*~

Five days later, Chrome stops attending school.

She is old enough to make the choice, but it is a difficult one.

A little voice in her mind insists upon abundant self-doubt: _how stupid must you be._ It sounds, she thinks, remarkably like her mother's tone.

Sitting at the bus stop, she closes her eye heavily. Pushes the misgivings aside. Any number of factors had contributed to her decision. Body too sore to crawl out of bed on time during most mornings of late, for a start; and when she is not forcing the edges of her consciousness to grow fires or adapt the proper hue to the moonlight which her imagination casts down from the sky, she is memorizing inventories of names. Families. Lines. Locations. Another massive event on the horizon. Menial chores: A household to work on. Floors to be cleaned, dirty dishes, windows to wash. Lambo to tend to.

Kyoko and Haru do shoo Chrome off, do insist that it's nothing, that they can see to household division of labour, at any rate. Chrome has other tasks, they say. But Chrome cannot help thinking that she owes it to them. To their courtesy. And that she owes it to Boss, because she still is not hurting with the intensity that he or Gokudera or Yamamoto must feel after their own training sessions. So Chrome sees to it that the Vongola's base shines.

What finally cements her decision to drop, however, are the looks the other girls have been giving her. If she has a mark on her throat, a strange rumple in her skirt: stares, whispers, wide eyes. Gossip. She forgets, sometimes, to enclose her minor physical imperfections within the confines of shielding illusions.

As one factor, it would be minimal, but taken with various and sundry other stresses, she decides that prioritizing her responsibilities towards the Family would be for the best.

Duffle bag at her feet, pocketbook strap loose on her forearm (it's a new one, her first purchase in a while; _Hello Kitty_ design, pink, with a black skull recently sewn onto the side), Chrome folds the papers she has signed, those which say that she is leaving her studies. Still sitting on the bench, she looks up at the horizon, which is grey with the coming rain, and the tightness and tension of the air mimic something inside of her chest.

Glance at the watch on her wrist, and Mukuro's voice, a slow easy undercurrent of laughter, says as if from the sky:

_They do grow up so quickly._

She closes her eye. Reaches after that presence; it sinks down, permeates her cells, a draught as if her pores are showered and cleansed from within, like a scrub in the onsen; that new and open feeling; clean and cool: it's the confidence which she clutches at and holds in her two hands -- which lets her know that she can do this, because she is never really alone in this world.

_Chrome._

And in the recesses of her mind, the phantom sensation of a hand across her forehead, sweeping her hair behind her ears. The ghostly perception of watching a smile which she does not actually watch on a face which is not there. As if he plucks her neurons like wires, to tell her what she will experience. His living presence she feels in the same manner each time: always cold (from the waters, that must be it). Distant, somehow; a consciousness which is alien, and half-sealed away, which leaps a little when she reaches for it, and she is always given the sense of being regarded as curious.

Albeit companionable.

The consciousness ripples.

_I wonder, at what age does the little bird leave its nest?_

The bus arrives; white and blue with a strip of red, rectangle sawed off at the edges. The door opens, though the driver never turns, and Chrome begins the ascent up the steps, wrinkling the paperwork in her clutch of it and the pocketbook.

 _At this age, Mukuro-sama,_ she tries.

_How gratifying it is to watch the wings spread. Yet, let us suppose that while in the sky, she confronts a skylark --_

Chrome takes a seat, and the vehicle hums with motion, as the first droplets of rain from the overcast sky begin to strike the cement outside.

The presence (almost lulled, when it is only the two of them, like a dozing machine, a car with the keys in the ignition, halted somewhere) stirs. Darkens.

Sense of a finger on a trigger, but there is no gun.

The shot that rings out is one of laughter.

_\-- let us hope that it will not peck her to death._

~*~

It is Chrome's first mission apart from the sheltering cluster of Sawada Tsunayoshi's Guardians, apart from Ken and Chikusa behind her or the girls sharing household space, and even Mukuro is silent as she removes her boots at the entrance and takes long strides along the tatami mats.

When she slides the rice paper doors aside, her shoulders are straightened with a sense of purpose.

Kyouya Hibari strikes her to the ground before she can stutter a greeting.

As Chrome reaches a hand to nurse the bruise on her jaw, chest heaving with the sudden need for air, she hears him proceed to strike down Kusakabe for allowing her in without his express consent.

"I have no patience for herbivores who get in my way," Hibari says, flatly, and Chrome does not know whether he refers to the physical space of his which she approached in her nascent attempt at a hello, or whether he is insinuating what he supposes will come of their time together. "Fifteen minutes."

There are no words in her vocabulary for what Chrome feels.

When the steel tapped her bone, reverberated in her marrow (a _tap_ it is, she is certain, as compared to what the man could do if he so chose), there was a sense beyond the brief physicality of it. A realization that gradually begins to accumulate.

Chrome thinks dizzily of the summers in Kokuyo, where she had huddled on the couch, the evening when she was dressed and perfumed, and a thousand other minutiae which in this very instant mean nothing.

That is the realization: Before a weapon, before a challenge like the challenges the others face, having confidence (which she does not) means nothing, being attractive (of which she is doubtful) means nothing, and speaking well (which she will never be able to do) is to no purposeful end.

The length of the tonfas is a border, a threshold, a set of measuring sticks. Respect is on the other end.

A clear, direct path.

Success is the world's most difficult goal, but also its most straightforward.

Chrome does not reach for Mukuro. There is no sound or feel of him now.

She picks herself off the floor and waits while her partner, kimono-clad, drinks a cup of tea, looking almost meditative as he reviews sheafs of what she presumes to be mission details. He does not cast a glance in her direction.

Chrome knows she is not welcome here. _Allowed_ is more the word. _Tolerated_ at best.

It was like that with her parents. With Ken and Chikusa. Even with the other Guardians, at first.

Except here, it's different. Here, she knows it is impersonal. This man could not care less about her character; he barely even seems to register her tie to Mukuro, but disdains her, at present, only for her own strength or a perceived lack thereof, a perceived need to grow, but there is no patronizing to it, no condescending kindness, and this, too, is new.

She has not demonstrated herself to be of sufficient mettle. Not yet. But she can.

She can win this.

~*~

The mission, Chrome is informed, is one of protection and retrieval.

A family in the alliance of Vongola, the Moretti, has recently been under siege. Vandalism; theft of funds, weaponry, and technology. Kusakabe relates the story methodically, informing Chrome that the Moretti family, like Vongola, is significant for ensuring the defense of those less capable: the rural working class within the industrial region of Sassuolo, Italy. Until the balance is restored, the bourgeoisie and working class alike are vulnerable as a district; this, Chrome learns early on, is why the battles never end: balance is only ever tenuous, at best, and the tides continually shift.

You can never really rest, because someone, somewhere, is inventing a stronger product to wipe your Family out.

Standing on the circular green of the landing pad, Chrome's hair blows into her eyes and her skirt flies up. The blades cut her with air so hard that she swallows a startled gasp, shielding her face with her forearm as the heels of her boots slowly edge forward on deer-like legs. Hibari's ascent is half-lunge half-climb; it's graceful how thoroughly he makes the vehicle succumb to the presence of his limbs, with one foot in the door and the other planted firmly on the skid, with his hand on the door and his body half-in, half-out, back rigid and shoulders raised.

Chrome thinks that he will not bother to turn, will not notice her ambling pace, but he does. The blades drown out the scoffing, though she sees it etched on his features.

Once she is inside and the machine lifts and Chrome finds herself staring at the outer world, she hears a soft thump and looks down to find that her _Hello Kitty_ pocketbook has been deposited at her feet. A hurried blush strokes across her cheeks before she can catch herself, and she fumbles her hands, thumbs playing with one another, before offering a quick mutter of, "Thank you."

She must have forgotten it. Embarrassing.

"I don't need your gratitude," is the immediate reply. "Save it for someone else."

Automatic: "Oh. All right."

"I won't coddle you like he's done. It's made you weak and stupid."

Chrome turns away and intently fixes her gaze on the door, looking for all the world as if tearing it open and jumping out would be the preferable option right at this moment, though the two are at five-hundred feet and rising steadily.

~*~

They arrive at an airport terminal for a connecting flight by jet.

When Chrome departs, the helicopter pilot smiles at her in passing.

One red eye glows in the afternoon light.

~*~

There are billions of souls strewn throughout the planet.

Milan, in Lombardy, urban province of Italy, fashion capital of the world. In the land where Verdi composed his operas, the weight of the Duomo presses down on Chrome's mind. She sits in mute acquiescence through a slow boat trip down an artificial canal, where lanterns glow in firefly rows across water into which the sunset pours itself, royal blues and purples; the lights hang on lines which criss-cross above their heads, and in the distance, hills and mountains and cathedrals spring forth like so many ornate mushrooms. The sky fills with ragged clouds, then sweeps them aside, and all she can hear is the motion of the oar on the water. As if they are lovers enjoying a leisurely outing, but Hibari sits with his arms folded, impervious to the size of any place -- impervious to _place_ in a way that Chrome is not, for he has only ever internalized one location as significant.

The boat takes them down some forgotten corridor, some side street, some back alley, and when Chrome departs, she feels a tug on her wrist.

She turns to meet Hibari's predator stare, opens to her mouth to ask what this is about, when Mukuro inside of her stirs, and she realizes she is not the one being viewed. The eyes tear through her, and Chrome falls into herself.

"Rokudo Mukuro," a voice says, far away.

"Hibari Kyouya." The rebuttal. "Shall we play a game of cards?"

The steel clashes, and someone, somewhere, rasps a laugh. "A sore loser, as ever."

Chrome wants to say something, perhaps: _Please let me depart_ (Was she not on a boat, at some point?), but there is no mouth, or rather her mouth is not her own, or rather she has no _body_ with which to speak, and her not-fingers scrabble wildly at the strange, reverberating words, at the white-hot energy which surges through her, past her: a lust for blood which her own body is not producing. Two bodies locked together, muscles straining, and then a break, a dance backwards, and a launching motion. Dizzying, the speed of it, as they clash again. Eruption of purple flames, and Chrome shudders as Mukuro slides away and parries.

"Certainly you must know what this mission is truly about." The eye flashes. Chrome feels it, like a wet twitch of muscle. "Tell me, how does that sit with you?"

A brief inhale. Sound of impatient disgust. "I don't care. I'm here to enforce discipline."

"I see. What admirable reasoning you have. Morality is of little consequence, after all?"

And then, amid the violence: a slight, wet sound. One mouth against another.

The old greeting (the old goodbye), and Chrome flushes at the sense of witnessing something private, but it's changing, already. Becoming the sense of --

Another strike, this one connecting, and Mukuro bleeds.

Mukuro bleeds.

And Chrome feels it. The tear of skin, the exhilaration of challenge; destruction: it makes her feel aroused and a little ill with the thought.

"It is good to stand in my native land again. I suppose you might be able to appreciate that, at least?" Hand to the face. Swipe of tongue where the blood runs.

"Your herbivore pet had better not get in my way."

"A royal straight flush has only _one_ ace, Kyouya Hibari." A moment of quiet, and then, "But nothing defeats this hand when taken as a whole. Don't flatter yourself to think you can deal better than I."

And then there is a long, dragging instant where Chrome thinks he is talking about her in some abstract way, and she wonders fleetingly if she knows enough about any particular card game to guess that he might have been offering some defense, and her partner hesitates as if contemplating for a second, and then.

She falls back into herself.

It is all she can do to plant her feet down before she topples into the canal.

Hibari _hmphs_ and drags her up by the shoulder.

They walk together in silence to the hotel.

~*~

 

There are billions of souls strewn throughout the planet.

Chrome sits on the bed and thumbs a gun, remembering the shooting lessons Bianchi gave her.

Italy. Here she is. Here she is in the land where Rokudo Mukuro was, improbably, born. She turns to the mirror. Fingers the bottom of her hair. (Maybe she will not cut it when it begins to grow again: a random musing.)

Her mind returns to the exchange. Concludes:

It's not _witnessing_ something private.

It's _becoming submerged_ in it.

Fifteen years old.

Chrome is becoming submerged.

 _An ironic metaphor, Nagi_ , says the voice in her mind as she turns off the light and lies down, single eye turned towards the Italian sky, taking in the view of the sleeping purple mountains in whose neighbours the gods were once believed to roam. _All things considered._

Her eye closes, and the impenetrable blue of midnight melts behind her eyelids.

She reaches through the glass, swims to him across the border of sleep and wakefulness. The waters rise over her wandering consciousness; a mind set in hypothermia, and even her body, distantly resting in the hotel room, takes in the sensation.

Chrome pulls aside the chains. Mukuro's eyes do not open.

_All Venice is sinking, I suppose._

And the smile curls in his voice.

_What did you mean before? About the mission?_

His hair sways in the water, blue-black kelp in a forgotten sea; lost to time and memory.

 _It is not the teacher's role to do the student's homework for her,_ he chides. _Some lessons you may only ever succeed in if you learn them for yourself._

Her confusion, she thinks, is evident.

He sighs. Adds: _We are contracted to Vongola, yes? We will do as we are ordered._ Slight ribbon of mirth: _For now, in the least._

_We?_

She had thought she was alone for this particular mission. Mukuro had certainly not been assisting her in any respect thus far, although Chrome does not begrudge this: it is (and so far as she has thought of it) hers and Hibari's.

_You are my proxy. Therefore. I am taken, regardless of my desires._

That strikes a chord within her, and she begins to protest.

 _I accepted this previously. Spare your sympathy._ Chrome curls in on herself, and the imagery grows dimmer. Darker. _I will waste no time despairing of my fate. I would rather --_

The sensations, the visions, come to her, and the force of his consciousness plunges her outwards. Apart, for now, from the hells Mukuro walks.

Chrome opens her eye. Exhales.

Sometimes, it is still terrifying to enter the landscape of his nightmares.

She knows, though, that he did not push her out to spare her.

He did so, rather, because she cannot feign apathy to his condition.

Thus, in the distance that cleaves them, for now, a new thought:

Tomorrow.

She makes a fist and clutches the Vongola ring in passing, then rolls over. After her visit to that place, the night air is warm on her skin. And when her eye closes again, it is a house of cards she sees -- no, not a house. A cathedral. The Duomo itself: stacked with the names of Families centuries old, offenses created decades before. At the touch of her fingers, the cards shiver, but do not collapse.

 _Patience and a delicate sensibility are required in certain matters,_ Mukuro says, and Chrome, for the first time, understands. His fingers trail through her hair.

 _I won't be ready for it to fall --_ he whispers, _until such time as it is perfectly constructed, with not a single piece missing._

Construction into destruction. Chrome does not know what to think of this, so she says, aloud, "A long way off."

"Years," he agrees, and the night gives itself over to absence -- to tomorrows not yet realized.


End file.
